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How about question 7? Abdul plans schedules for several biologists who are researching the manatee. One biologist must travel from Newport to Russell Key. Late

How about question 7? Abdul plans schedules for several biologists who are researching the manatee. One biologist must travel from Newport to Russell Key. Later the biologist has a meeting in Islamorada. Abdul must use the map below to ﬁnd the distance from Russell Key to Islamorada to determine how much time the biologist can spend on Russell Key. [diagram of a right-angled triangle, three points labelled "Russell Key", "Newport" and "Islamorada", one side labelled "13.2 mi.", the other "15.5 mi."] What is the distance in miles (mi.) from Russell Key to Islamorada? The whole manatee/biologists/Abdul story is irrelevant and distracting, relies on an incredibly unlikely coincidence (the right-angle), assumes that Abdul is bright enough to get a map out and measure distances but not bright enough to measure the distance he actually cares about, and confusingly sets the reader up to expect a question about time rather than distance. My version: "[diagram]. How far is it from Russell Key to Islamorada?" or skip the place names entirely and "[diagram] What is the length of the third side of this triangle?" (edited to remove a comment about Islamorada -- turns out that it is a real place. It also turns out that the map seems to be using real place names, but not real distances, which can only serve to confuse people who know the area.)

ZeroGravitas 15y ago
"Islamorada? really? is that in Koranistan?" It's in Florida, as are the students this test is aimed at (and the Manatees too for that matter).
schrototo 15y ago
I think that's the whole point of these types of problems: the first step is always to parse the question, find out what's the actual problem and which data is relevant. You know, just like in real life. (Granted, those particular examples may be especially contrived, but that's a different problem...)
- DanielStraight 15y ago
  Indeed. The entire purpose of word problems is to see if you can apply math to real life, to see if you can come up with formulas to fit the situation at hand. You aren't given formulas in real life. If I save a certain percent, P, of my monthly income, N, and I want to save an amount, X, to buy something, and I want to know how long in months, M, I'm going to have to save. The formula M = X / (P * N) [or P / 100 depending on how we're expressing the percent] isn't going to magically appear in front of me. Whether I can solve it or not won't matter if I can't come up with it. That's a trivial example, but I hope the point is clear. Word problems are supposed to test your ability to convert life to math, not just your ability to do simple algebra. Which is why it's especially concerning that in many of the word problems they actually give the formula. It defeats the whole purpose of making it a word problem.
  - hessenwolf 15y ago
    Yes - there is nothing as sexy as being given a big chunky real-world problem with no predefined mathematical representation and getting to pick and choose your own. I live for these moments.
MichaelJW 15y ago
Dan Meyer often talks about this so-called "pseudocontext": http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?cat=89 http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?cat=89

ZeroGravitas 15y ago

"Islamorada? really? is that in Koranistan?" It's in Florida, as are the students this test is aimed at (and the Manatees too for that matter).

schrototo 15y ago

I think that's the whole point of these types of problems: the first step is always to parse the question, find out what's the actual problem and which data is relevant. You know, just like in real life. (Granted, those particular examples may be especially contrived, but that's a different problem...)

DanielStraight 15y ago
Indeed. The entire purpose of word problems is to see if you can apply math to real life, to see if you can come up with formulas to fit the situation at hand. You aren't given formulas in real life. If I save a certain percent, P, of my monthly income, N, and I want to save an amount, X, to buy something, and I want to know how long in months, M, I'm going to have to save. The formula M = X / (P * N) [or P / 100 depending on how we're expressing the percent] isn't going to magically appear in front of me. Whether I can solve it or not won't matter if I can't come up with it. That's a trivial example, but I hope the point is clear. Word problems are supposed to test your ability to convert life to math, not just your ability to do simple algebra. Which is why it's especially concerning that in many of the word problems they actually give the formula. It defeats the whole purpose of making it a word problem.
- hessenwolf 15y ago
  Yes - there is nothing as sexy as being given a big chunky real-world problem with no predefined mathematical representation and getting to pick and choose your own. I live for these moments.

MichaelJW 15y ago

Dan Meyer often talks about this so-called "pseudocontext": http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?cat=89 http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?cat=89